If he means the Super Bowl Ravens champs of a year ago, OK. But not being Super Bowl caliber hasn't exactly stopped the Ravens from beating the Browns 11 times consecutively.

The better statement for Haden to make: the Browns aren’t the Browns of old.

To safely make that claim will require better quarterback play than we’re conditioned to expect from the Browns when they line up against the Ravens.

Jason Campbell becomes the sixth Browns’ starter to face the Ravens since Joe Flacco’s rookie year. And that 6-1 quarterback roll call is the only instance of the Browns outscoring the Ravens since the woodshed beatings began.

The Browns have scored more than 17 points against the Ravens just once – a 37-27 game in 2008. They've thrown six TD passes and 18 interceptions.

“Humbled and embarrassed one week earlier, the defending Super Bowl champion Baltimore Ravens cranked up the defense to earn another win over their favorite patsies, the Cleveland Browns.”

The Ravens may not be the Ravens of 2012. But if the Browns aren’t the patsies of old, they only have to prove it.

SPINOFFS

• New York Jets’ owner Woody Johnson says his team, coming off a 49-9 loss to Cincinnati, is “improving rapidly.”

I believe Baghdad Bob said the same of Saddam Hussein’s prospects for defeating U.S. forces in Iraq.

• The 49ers welcomed back Aldon Smith from an alcohol treatment program. Among his legal issues is a lawsuit filed by a man who alleges he was shot at a June 2012 party thrown by Smith and former teammate Delanie Walker.

According to the suit, Smith and Walker gun shots in the air to signal guests that it was time to leave a party where the two charged $10 admission and $5 per drink.

Because they need the money?

And didn’t want to run up the electricity bill by flicking the lights?

• During Smith’s absence, the 49ers made the “good faith” gesture of paying him his weekly salary of $99,000.

Maybe it's because I rub elbow patches with pipe-smoking sports writers so much, but how anybody can get by on less than $100,000 a week is a mystery.

• It’s routine for NBA teams to share the chapel before games. According to reports, the Clippers sent word to the Golden State Warriors that they’d have to use the chapel separately before Thursday’s game.

Bad blood left over from last season apparently.

You know the bumper sticker: WWJD

What Wouldn’t Jesus Do?

• The NFLPA is reportedly focusing on guard Richie Incognito in the harassment of Miami Dolphins tackle Jonathan Martin, who abruptly left the team after a cafeteria incident involving teammates.

Incognito often shows up on lists of the league’s dirtiest players, too, but an unnamed Dolphins official told ESPN Incognito is a “model citizen.”

So, if true, that would make him misunderstood as well as misnamed.

• If it’s true Martin was harassed, it answers the question of what some high school football players do later in life when they can no longer make fun of the smartest kids in the class.

They pick on the guy from Stanford.

• David Ortiz was previously linked to PEDs. At age 37, he hit .773 in the World Series.

These factors led ESPN’s Colin Cowherd -- and, to be fair, others -- to express disbelief at Ortiz’s accomplishments in the postseason, saying, in part, “The story of David Ortiz batting .733 – about as believable as Big Foot.”

Ridiculous.

Based on the reaction, Andrew Bynum back on the basketball court was the real Yeti sighting.

• Usually hitters have to turn in big power numbers before PED insinuations find them.

If that’s a skid, they’ll never be able to wipe away the tire marks Byron Scott’s Cavs left outside The Q.

• Redskins’ tight end Fred Davis told USA Today that he’s nodded off in team skull sessions but that “I never slept through a whole meeting.”

Too much discipline to do that.

• Former Washington defensive lineman Albert Haynesworth says Robert Grifffin III will find out that head coach Mike Shanahan is “conniving.”

You can look at this two ways. One, the way Chris Cooley sees it. The former Skins’ tight end called Haynesworth “an awful human being” and said Haynesworth’s goal was to “make a large signing bonus and then get released and not have to do any of the work.”

Or you can simply say if anybody knows what constitutes “conniving” it’s Haynesworth.

• Somehow Red Sox fans endured not winning a World Series at home since 1918. That’s a 95-year streak.

And now their long nightmare of winning two of three World Series on the road since 2004 is over.

• Imagine how empty you would’ve felt if the Indians won the World Series in Game 7 that night in South Florida.

• The Red Sox were a worst-to-first fairy tale in 2013.

If, in your rags-to-riches story, the World Series winner goes from third in payroll in 2012 all the way to fifth this year.

How did they do it?

• Buccaneers’ lineman Gerald McCoy said coaches would rather he not help opponents up after plays, but that he believes good sportsmanship has its place.

Head coach Greg Schiano qualified his stance:

“You can help a guy up but look him in the eye and tell him, “I’m coming back to get you again.”

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